by A. J. Jacobs
zucchetto
The skullcap worn by Roman Catholic clergymen—the last liturgical vestment in the Britannica!
Zulu, the African nation (whose founder, Shaka, by the way, became “openly psychotic” when his mother died, and refused to allow crops to be planted).
My God, seven more pages.
Leopold Zunz, a Jewish scholar.
Zurich ware, a type of Swiss porcelain.
Zveno Group, a Bulgarian political party.
Zywiec
And here it is. I have arrived. The final entry of the Britannica’s 65,000 entries, the last handful of the 44 million words. The bizarre thing is, my pulse is thumping as if I were running an actual marathon. I’m amped up.
I take a deep breath to calm myself, and then I read about Zywiec. Zywiec is a town in south-central Poland. It’s known for its large breweries and a 16th-century sculpture called The Dormant Virgin. Population thirty-two thousand.
And that’s it. At 9:38 P.M. on an otherwise unremarkable Tuesday night, sitting in my customary groove on the white couch, I have finished reading the 2002 edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. I’m not sure what to do. I shut the back cover quietly. I stand up from the couch, then sit back down.
There’s no ribbon to break, no place to plant a flag. It’s a weird and anti-climactic feeling. The entry itself doesn’t help. If the Britannica were a normal book, the ending would presumably have some deeper meaning, some wrap-it-all-up conclusion or shocking twist. But everything in the EB is a slave to the iron discipline of alphabetization, so I’m left with an utterly forgettable entry about a beer-soaked town in south-central Poland. Zywiec. I guess I knew it wouldn’t hold all the secrets to the universe (zywiec: a mysterious substance found in badger fur is the reason to go on living!), but still, it’s a little disappointing. There’s something sad about finishing a huge, yearlong project, an immediate postpartum depression.
I slide the volume back into its space on the mustard-colored shelf, where I expect it will stay for a long time. I wander out to the living room.
“Done,” I tell my wife.
“Done for the night?”
“No, done. As in done, done.”
She throws open her arms. I get a congratulatory hug and kiss.
“Wait a second,” she says. “I have to document this.” Julie runs off to the bedroom and reappears with our video camera.
“A.J. Jacobs, you finished reading the Encyclopaedia Britannica from A to Z. What are you going to do now?”
“Um …” I shake my head. I really don’t know. I’m stumped.
“Are you going to Disneyland?” prompts Julie.
“Yes, maybe I’ll go to Disneyland, founded by Walt Disney, creator of Oswald the Rabbit.”
Julie clicks off the camera.
“How about a celebratory dinner?” she asks.
“Yeah, why not?” That’ll be nice, a dinner with the long-neglected Julie—that is her name, right? “You want to finish your West Wing?” I ask.
“Sure.”
So I sit on the couch next to Julie and watch the end of The West Wing, which is set in the White House, a structure Thomas Jefferson called “big enough for two emperors, one pope, and the grand lama.”
I think back to my parents’ friend who told me the fable wherein the wise men of the kingdom condensed all the encyclopedia’s knowledge into a single sentence: “This too shall pass.” That’s not a bad moral. If you want a single sentence, you could do worse. What’s my sentence? I better come up with one now, because at this very moment, I’ve got more information than I ever will, before that evil Ebbinghaus curve kicks in.
Frankly, I’m not sure what my sentence is. Maybe I’m not smart enough to come up with a single sentence summing up the Britannica. Maybe it’d be better to try a few sentences, and see what sticks. So here goes:
I know that everything is connected like a worldwide version of the six-degrees-of-separation game. I know that history is simultaneously a bloody mess and a collection of feats so inspiring and amazing they make you proud to share the same DNA structure with the rest of humanity. I know you’d better focus on the good stuff or you’re screwed. I know that the race does not go to the swift, nor the bread to the wise, so you should soak up what enjoyment you can. I know not to take cinnamon for granted. I know that morality lies in even the smallest decisions, like whether to pick up and throw away a napkin. I know that an erythrocyte is a red blood cell, not serum. I know firsthand the oceanic volume of information in the world. I know that I know very little of that ocean. I know that I’m having a baby in two months, and that I’m just the tiniest bit more prepared for having him (I can tell him why the sky is blue—and also the origin of the blue moon, in case he cares), but will learn 99 percent of parenthood as I go along. I know that—despite the hyposomnia and the missed Simpsons episodes—I’m glad I read the Britannica. I know that opossums have thirteen nipples. I know I’ve contradicted myself a hundred times over the last year, and that history has contradicted itself thousands of times. I know that oysters can change their sex and Turkey’s avant-garde magazine is called Varlik. I know that you should always say yes to adventures or you’ll lead a very dull life. I know that knowledge and intelligence are not the same thing—but they do live in the same neighborhood. I know once again, firsthand, the joy of learning. And I know that I’ve got my life back and that in just a few moments, I’m going to have a lovely dinner with my wife.
ADDITIONAL SOURCES
BROWN, CRAIG. “How the First Fly Guy Went Up, Up and Wa-hey …” Edinburgh Evening News, December 9, 2003.
COLEMAN, ALEXANDER and CHARLES SIMMONS. All There Is to Know: Readings from the Illustrious Eleventh Edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1994.
FLAUBERT, GUSTAVE. Bouvard and Pécuchet with the Dictionary of Received Ideas. New York: Penguin Group, 1976.
KOGAN, HERMAN. The Great EB: The Story of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1958.
KONING, HANs. “Onward and Upward with the Arts: The Eleventh Edition.” The New Yorker, March 2, 1981.
MARKS-BEALE, ABBY. 10 Days to Faster Reading. New York: Warner Books, 2001.
MCCABE, JOSEPH. The Lies and Fallacies of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Escondido, Calif.: The Book Tree, 2000.
MCCARTHY, MICHAEL. “It’s Not True About Caligula’s Horse; Britannica Checked—Dogged Researchers Answer Some Remarkable Queries.” Wall Street Journal, April 22, 1999.
MCHENRY, ROBERT. “Whatever Happened to Encyclopedic Style.” Chronicle of Higher Education, February 28, 2003.
OSTROV, RICK. Power Reading. North San Juan, Calif.: Education Press, 2002.
SARTE, JEAN-PAUL. Nausea. New York: New Directions, 1964.
SHNEIDMAN, EDWIN/ “Suicide On My Mind, Britannica on My Table.” American Scholar, autumn 1998.
STERNBERG, ROBERT J. Successful Intelligence: How Practical and Creative Intelligence Determine Success in Life. New York: Plume, 1997.
——— ed. Handbook of Intelligence. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
INDEX
The page references in this index correspond to the printed edition from which this ebook was created. To find a specific word or phrase from the index, please use the search feature of your ebook reader.
accents, glottal stop in, 116
accidents:
blindness resulting from, 29
fabricated, 22
accomplishments, EB-worthy, 161
Adams, John:
Jefferson’s July 4th predeceasing of, 253
retirement pleasures of, 80, 82
air travel, ethical dilemma in, 227–28
Alaska:
AJ and Beryl lost in, 297–99
“mosts” claimed for, 145
Allah, in tampered database, 128
alphabet, self-taught man’s reading arranged by, 249
American Crossword Puzzle Tournament, 135–39
> American Gothic, who are these people?, 362
anesthetics, 45–46
animals:
guard, unexpected example of, 258
humans and, 251–52
sleazeball behaviors of, 50–51
stuffed, 94
voices of, 116
Zeus transformations into, 366
anti-neutrino particle, memorizing definition of, 199
aposiopesis T-shirts, 181
Archimedes’ screw, EB blasphemed on, 106
Ardrey, Robert, on miracle of man, 259–60, 262
Aristotle:
self-serving marriage maxim of, 20, 74, 265
telegony endorsed by, 144
art, serious appreciation of, 231
atomic bomb (Fat Man), Nagasaki as secondary target of, 357
Attila the Hun:
pros and cons of, 143, 160
unfortunate wedding night death of, 237
audiences, riots and uproars avoided by, 317–18
Australia, hereditary obsession with, 146
authors, good looks an asset to, 257
Aztecs, Planet of the Apes idea lifted from, 20
Babinski reflex, testing for, 230
bad ideas, inertia of, 92
Baghdad, monument to Ali Baba’s housekeeper in, 154
Ball of Fire (movie), anti-intellectual vs. pro-education themes in, 238–39
barnacles, crab testes consumed by, 157
baseball:
bearded apocalyptic cult in, 247–48
how to talk about, 157–58
Reggie era in, 156–57
bastards, notable, 278
battles, nudity in, 25, 54, 204
beans, Pythagorean commandment against, 274
beauty, eternal, 265
beauty patches, design and placement of, 252
Bender, Steve, Operation Britannica graded by, 95–97
Bible, 70–71
encyclopedia as, 328
loopholes in, 75, 170
walnut-sized, 161
Binet, Alfred, 326
bioweapons, Louis XIV’s suppression of, 187–88
birthdays, Einstein’s rejection of, 203
blasphemy case, boob defense in, 260–61
blue-footed booby (just a coincidence), mating dance of, 153
blue moons, cause of, 116
bodies, temperature of, 92
body parts:
embalming of, 74
modification of, 130
in note designations, 15
official names for, 22
unusual numbers of, 11–12
body types, classification of, 234
Bolivia, haziness about a river or two in, 42
book title, one-size-fits-all, 172
Bouvard and Pécuchet (Flaubert, that superior bastard), 96–97, 250
brain:
atrophy of, 16
common hazards to, 17–18
cranial capacity and, 179, 180
of Einstein, 202
gullibility of, 76
mucus originating in, 27
ongoing loss of cells in, 224–25
playroom compared with, 206
brain damage, AJ’s fear of, 16, 17–18, 27, 132
breasts:
in boob defense, 260–61
modification of, 130
see also nipples
British cryptic, clue to “astern” in, 136–37
British-to-American translations, 209
Brod, Max, Kafka’s final wish interpreted by, 165–66
Brown University, 2
ecstasy at, 71
famous attendees at, 127
Brummel, Beau, rise and fall of, 64
burial:
positions in, 30
premature, cell phones for, 55
Bush, George W., days taken off by, 134
calculator tricks, Mensan interest in, 150
camps, all-male, hazards of, 268
capitalism, businessman’s attack on, 82–83
Carol, Aunt, Sartre’s Nausea as gift from, 248, 250
cats:
Big Boy and Wild Thing, 243
character of, 78–79
cry of (cri-du-chat syndrome), 282
in grammar question, 303
songs about, 93
celebrities:
anatomically interesting, 32–33
cautionary lessons taken from, 8
Dalton offspring of, 85
real names of, 41–42
Celebrity Deathmatch, 217
cell phones:
in coffins, 55
in movie theaters, 123
Central Park, identification of, 319
Chad (as well as Bolivia), haziness about a river or two in, 43
Challis, James, planetary gaffe of, 48–49
Charles II, King of England, illegitimate children of, 25, 38
Charleses, aids to memorizing of, 37–38
cheese knives, unanswered questions about, 210
cholesterol, high, 292
cilantro, see coriander
civilization, Pax Mongolia and spread of, 114
Civil War, U.S.:
Garibaldi invited to, 109
oratory in, 115–16
rebel spy–Union officer love story in, 44–45
Taiping Rebellion compared with, 322
classification of body types, 234
colonialism, percentage of evil in, 87
communism, foxhunter’s cofounding of, 82–83
Complete Family News (newsletter), 343–44
compulsions, unkickable, 129–30
conversational gambits:
“a-ak” not helpful in, 7
of AJ Sr., 72–74
internal “ding” heard at onset of, 23, 43
knowledge in, 11–13
at Mensa events, 146–52
in ninety minutes with Senator Kennedy, 166–68
“Who is buried in Grant’s Tomb?,” 113
see also evasion strategies; knowledge displays
cooking, coriander in, 65–66
coral snakes, identification of, 65–66
coriander, 208
crab soup topped with, 65–66, 239
corpses, sale of, 36–37, 52
courtship, see romance and courtship
Crapper, Thomas, myth of, 266
Crossfire, AJ as reticent debater on, 312–13, 315
cross-referencing, meaningful, 340–41
crossword puzzles, another debacle, 135–39, 232
cruelty, in boy’s camps, 268
Cruise, Tom, EB silent on, 87–88
cucumbers, “vampirelike lecherous creature” from Japan obsessed with, 166
curiosity, about everything, 102–3
curses, usefull, 234–35
Dalton School:
AJ’s revisit to, 301–5
ethical relativism discovered at, 85–87
dances:
Saint Vitus, 237–38
tarantella, 238
Dante Alighieri, video dating prescribed for, 258–59
death:
of family member, 284–85
metaphors for, 30
obituary read before, 23
passions moderated by contemplation of, 284
preservation of body after, 25
after reading EB, 35
unusual forms of, 9–10, 21–22, 283–84
see also burial; corpses
death penalty, AJ in Columbia debate on, 312, 313–14
DeBakey, Michael, 361
as EB reader, 270–71
definitions:
of “ambergris,” 194–95
of “anti-neutrino particle,” 199
of “axillism,” 352
of “berry,” 283
of “book,” 26
of “erythrocyte,” 354–56
of “fruit,” 282
of “haboob,” 126
of “inch,” 201
of “infix,” 127
of
“intelligence,” 19, 244–45, 325–26
of “jacks and jills,” 233
of “kilogram,” 201
memorizing of, 199
of “meter,” 201
of “mushrooming,” 235–36
of “mutualism,” 218
of “ooze,” 240
of “pachycephalosaurus,” 247
of “peninsula,” 128
of “peon,” 123
of “reading,” 276
of “riot,” 293
of “suicide,” 8
of “tarantella,” 238
of various rhetorical devices, 181–82
of “wergild,” 359
déjà vu, jamais vu vs., 197
Delfin, John, crossword philosophy of, 138
depression, evolutionary role of, 75–76
Descartes, René:
cross-eyed–women fetish of, 55–56, 92, 148, 192, 244
joke about bartender and, 337
as proto-Freudian, 55–56
Disclosures and Remedies Under the Security Law (Jacobs Sr.), 15
divorce, Pueblo-style, 61, 237
dodo bird, scattered remnants of, 321
Doherty, Shannen, marriage spans of, 109
Doone, Lorna, cookies confused with, 120
Douglas, Cousin, language corrected by, 176–79
dreams:
creative, 309
self-fulfilling, 308–9
duplicity:
of biblical Jacob, 158
of males in courtship strategies, 51–52
earth:
locating AJ on, 140
search for intelligent life on, 243–46
time taken by rotation of, 136
unrestrained outlay of facts about, 68–70
Earth Mother, as fertility goddess, 94
Easter Bunny, background and character of, 94
Ebbinghaus, Herman, “forgetting curve” of, 84, 154, 179, 304, 368
Ebert jokes, 63
Ecclesiastes, 288, 290, 361
E! channel, 330
$8000 question, audience thanked for answer to, 354
Einstein, Albert, 202–5
see also relativity
embalming:
Egyptian recipe for, 74
as loophole in wife’s will, 74, 75, 338
Eminems, miniversions of, 301–5
Encyclopaedia Britannica:
admirable anality of, 128
alphabetical sequence of, 71, 367
bloopers in, 127–28
brilliant quotations helpful in getting into, 180–81
as bug killer, 163
card games clarified by, 122
career ideas in, 348–50
